Tales of Wonderland
by CayshaGriffin
Summary: A little one shot about the ways the Mad Hatter's tea party can be enjoyable when you're not allowed your promised tea. Based off yet slightly askew from Deviant Art's BriChan and her wonderful AlicexHatter comic. More may come if it's enjoyed.


Dislcaimer: I do not own Alice in Wonderland or the Mad Hatter. The story line is mine and nothing else.

This coupling didn't even occur to me until I saw the wonderful work of Bri-Chan, an artist on Deviant Art who draws a wonderful comic centered around AlicexHatter. Check her out and you'll see why this ship is wonderful. So I dedicate this first piece to her.

And pretty please read and review.

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The Mad Hatter came bounding out of the house at a bit of a gallop. It was fairly ridiculous to see a grown man do this, but for a man who was supposedly mad he wasn't very much so. He was also very clever.

When he saw Alice hesitantly enter the backyard tea party the way she usually did the Hatter smiled. She did always come back.

"Alice! My dear child, you're back!" Hatter bellowed cheerfully and was at her side with suprising speed.

Alice smiled when she saw the Hatter but her nose wrinkled a bit when he called her child. Alice was no longer a little girl, something that had not gone unnoticed by the Hatter.

" Good afternoon Mr. Hatter." Alice said with a friendly nod instead of the curtsy she'd given the first time they'd met.

" Oh my dear," he said dramatically and gave her chin a little pat. " I've told you before it's just Hatter. Mr. Hatter is my father."

The pretty blush that painted the young woman's cheeks at the correction was completely adorable. The Hatter was pleased he had caused it.

" My apologies," she said and curtsied this time. " Good afternoon Hatter."

The Hatter grinned and gave a rather extravagant bow that nearly dislodged the large top hat from his head. " Good afternoon Alice."

Alice laughed, a demure sound due to her upbringing away from Wonderland. But around the Hatter and his wild antics it often became a true laugh soon enough. Not only was he a strangely attractive man with violet eyes and a smattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose and cheeks; younger then she'd remembered in childhood and taller. But his outrageous behavior gave Alice permission to break away from her strictly schooled manners.

The Hatter had been awfully friendly to her since she'd returned to Wonderland and slightly less mad when she visited. Though news from others like the March Hare and the Cheshire Cat said the Hatter was just as made as ever when Alice wasn't around. She often wondered which one was the facade, his madness or rare glimpses of sanity. Either way she adored him and his habits, not that she would ever admit it publicly. He might go on some rant about how that was an awfully rude joke to say she loved him.

" Tea?" The Hatter said suddenly and pulled Alice from her thoughts.

The Hatter had a teapot, one of his many in hand and a slightly manic smile on his face that made Alice both slightly nervous and giddy.

" Yes, of course. Who doesn't want tea at a tea party?" She teased, going to sit in the chair the Hatter had already pulled out for her.

" Of course, of course. Sit down, sit down. A cup for the lady!" The Hatter said before running down the length of the too long table to find a cup, though Alice was grinning like... ..well like her companion at the cup that was sitting right in front of her.

As the Hatter searched for an appropriate cup for Alice he wondered if she knew how all the changes in Wonderland, especially the changes in himself were because of her. On her return a year ago at the ripe age of twenty the whole of this world had come back to life. And with her age came different ideas in her head, different desires. One of them was love. It was her love that changed him from the squat, cronish creature she'd made him out to be as a child to the young man now racing about the tea table like a frantic, mind you mad, schoolboy. But except for the outward change which he could not complain about the Mad Hatter had not changed at all on the inside.

How an innocent like Alice had set her eye and heart on a raving lunatic like him was a puzzlement that made the Hatter grin. How had he managed that luck? Just like the duck wonders about how to cluck and make it sound like a bugle. (It is the Hatter's mind after all.)

" I have found a cup!" The Hatter said triumphantly, holding the dainty blue cup up for the wold to see.

He was soon back besides Alice's chair and pouring her the promised cup of tea. Suprinsingly the Hatter then sat in the chair next to her without a cup for himself and propped his chin in the palm of his gloved hand. The brim of his top hat falling just a bit to shade his face.

Alice eyed him suspiciously but brought the cup up to her lips anyway and stopped, just shy of touching. She waited but nothing happened. She glanced at the Hatter but he just gave her a goofy grin. Alice set her cup back down on the table untouched and the Hatter frowned.

" Why aren't you yelling at me?" She asked casually, as if being yelled at by a friend was a normal accurance.

The Hatter looked slightly shocked. " Am I supposed to?"

" Every time I come for tea, the moment I'm about to drink you shout at me to 'move down, clean cup' and all other nonsense. Why aren't you doing that?" She sounded a bit exasperated that he had not played his normal part.

The Hatter clucked his tongue. " I'm mad deary, mad people never do what they're expected to do. That monotony is left to the people like you who are supposed to be in their right minds." He said and tapped Alice's temple which made her blink. " Though I am told that the left mind is just as nice. All the sounds and pretty colors are supposed to be astounding."

" Well who drinks tea at these parties?" She was getting a bit flustered now. " I mean, I never have."

Hatter got an idea and smiled.

" No little Alice, you haven't. " He said and pushed up the brim of his hat before leaning forward and placing a kiss on the tip of her nose. It made her squeak, much cuter then the door mouse and the Hatter quickly went to the source of the sound and kissed her on the lips.

In reality it was a quick succession of actions and the Hatter leaned back in his chair a few moments later with a grin and Alice's untouched tea cup in his hand. Alice was sitting perfectly still, trying very hard to figure out what had just happened. She decided that tea was the overrated part of the Mad Hatter's tea party. The best part was the madman himself.


End file.
